Theme In Lord Of The Flies: Children And Fear

1141 words - 5 pages

Children are innocent and free-spirited; this is why they are so naive. Which in turn makes them makes them to be easily frightened. In the novel, Lord of the Flies, William Golding writes about a group of boys who are stranded on a deserted island. At first, the boys try to make a government to keep the island under control; but their fears start to govern them towards the end of the of book. Fear is a major theme in this book.The boys in the beginning of the book are trying to make best of the situation at hand. They construct a government choosing, Ralph as the chief. Things were not perfect but the boys, being children, didn't seem to worry too much. They were busy either playing, swimming, or exploring. When fear got introduced onto the island, this is when trouble begins. The children are in the middle of a meeting, when an unnamed little boy, with a mulberry-colored birthmark asks Ralph what he is planning to do with the "snake-thing" later naming it "Beastie". Ralph tries to convince the little boy that there is no snake-thing or beast, while the rest of the boys laughed at the boy. However, each time Ralph says there was no such beast; the boys begin to think to themselves that maybe there was a beast living on the island. Everything seems to go back to normal, when Ralph says that they need to build a fire on the mountain. But now that the fear was instilled in them, things seemed different on the island. It's this little spark that makes the children generate different ideas about life on the island and ultimately make the children paranoid.Ralph's fear of being stranded on the island forever becomes his top priority since becoming chief. This conflicts with Jack's view of what is most important. To Jack the most important thing is hunting meat for the boys to eat. ii "'I was chief, and you were going to do what I said. You talk. But you can't even build huts- then you go off hunting and let out the fire'. Ralph said.... One of the smaller hunters began to wail. The dismal truth was filtering through to everybody. Jack went very red as he hacked and pulled at the pig. 'The job was too much. We needed everyone.' Jack said. 'You could have had everyone when the shelters were finished. But you had to hunt-'said Ralph. 'We needed meat.' Jack cried.' p. 70-71Because Jack let the fire go out, a ship passes by the island, not noticing the boys. Later on we see that Jack combines his fear of the beast with his love for hunting, and he starts to become fascinated with finding the beast and then killing it himself.A short while after that incident, the children hold a meeting in which another little boy, Phil, states that he saw the beast crawling around at night. As Ralph, looks into the matter; the children soon find out that the beast that Phil saw was just Simon going to his special place. Jack then says how he and his hunters have been to every part on the island and that they have yet to see the beast. However, another boy named Percival...

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